3 out of 5

Developed by: Jason Rothenberg

covers season 1

Cautiously do we approach the new CW drama.  ‘Arrow’ started out surprisingly promising in its first season, only to become rather over-stuffed (and more ‘ CW’ed ‘) in its second season.  ‘The 100’ has the hallmarks of the station – everyone’s a model, the principles are caught up in a love triangle – but then, magically, during the course of its first 13 episodes, it managed to dodge the baggage that comes with most of these contrivances and stay, surprisingly, fairly dedicated to its sci-fi genre.  While we could point to the ‘Arrow’ example again, what makes ‘100’ end up standing out further are its flaws, as they seem to be evidence of a show actually trying to struggle free of the overall CW vibe to stand on its own.  Taking the general premise of Kass Morgan’s novel, ‘100’ gets right down to business from the start: humans have long since fled Earth post nuclear war; we now live on space station The Ark.  Unfortunately, resources are starting to dwindle, and desperation has us sending down 100 prisoners – conveniently all teens, as anyone over 18 who commits a crime is executed – back to the surface to see if it can sustain life.  The teens scuffle, Lord of the Flies, and eventually sorta organize, while our main hero, Clarke (Eliza Taylor), and villain, Bellamy (Bobby Morley) are clearly outlined.  The show drops in evidence of a race still living on the Earth – ‘Grounders’ – as well as signs of mutation from fallout, and occasionally cuts back to The Ark to show us the worried parents and politicians.  Seems like easy setup for plenty of CW teen anarchy and lessons of acceptance between families.  …And sure, that stuff occurs, but then ‘100’ doesn’t seem to want to exactly give us the easy setup.  The show takes quite a while to find its direction, wandering between showing us more of The Ark than one would assume of a show whose posters depict primarily the teens, and then random, brutal moments of realism for the 100 facing up to the fact that survival is survival… and won’t be a teen party.  Yes, admittedly, this means that the series drags a bit, because you’re not quite certain what the end game is.  But it finds its footing: characters start to feel fleshed out, and the Grounders can take over the needed role of foe, and petty squabbling (on Earth, on The Ark) can be mostly set aside for a greater good.  The season ended incredibly strongly.  Hopefully the writers will stand by the choices they’d been making going forward – to keep the show sci-fi, and not helm it specifically for CW – so we can actually look forward to a solid genre show.